Ganesh chaturthi 2017, 25th Aug

Wednesday, October 31, 2012

Adhirasam is my all time favourite. In my childhood, I used to like adhirasam made with sugar instead of jaggery. My mom never forgot to make a special batch of adhirasam with sugar specially for me. So I always wanted to try out myself and make a step by step post detailed for keeping it as record and for the readers too. To be honest, for past 4 years, for every diwali, I tried, tried and tried, but some how I made some silly mistakes and flopped. But each time I learnt my mistake. As we dont make adhirasam other than for diwali, I had to wait for an year every time.

It is very easy to make for my mom and MIL, so its all about experience. This time, I tried very carefully and followed my moms instructions. And now I can also confidently make adhirsam every year. This post is sure a record for me. If you are also like me who loves adhirsam and want to make at home, I would recommend to buy jaggery (paagu vellam) that is slightly with red shade rather than yellow. Also raw rice (maavu arisi) from the local shops. But any jaggery and raw rice works for this recipe. Just saying if its available in your living area, then you can make best use of it :)

Monday, October 29, 2012

I always love making maida biscuits right from childhood. Me and my bro used to help my mom by rolling and cutting them into diamond shapes. The best part I like to do is rolling the cutter to make the diamond shape. My mom has a special spoon especially for this (also for cutting sweet somas-recipe soon!). Its called ‘Somas karandi’. It is made of pithalai, one side with a spoon and other side with a wheel with ridges to make design while it cuts. It will be similar to pizza cutter, only that this is small.

Wednesday, October 24, 2012

Its a long time wish for me to make pasta sauce at home. I love pomodoro, arrabiata sauces from Pasta mania and love the pasta sauce with carrots that they serve in IKEA. I like IKEA sauce better as it has veggies and its sweet in taste too. So after browsing few recipes, I took an idea from this post and tweaked the recipe to suit my taste buds. It came out great, tasted and smelt so good. So here is the recipe. Its very easy to make with simple ingredients you have in your pantry. Now a days kids love pasta more, so why not make your own pasta sauce? Will be handy for your kids when they come back from school!

Monday, October 22, 2012

Elephant yam roast/ yam fry/ senai kizhangu roast is my favourite fry. But I make it very rarely as Vj doesn't like it. Many people doesn't like it as it gives an itchy feel in your tongue while eating. But when properly cooked, it can be eliminated. I referred Kribha’s blog for this, but adapted the recipe to suit my taste buds.

Wednesday, October 17, 2012

This is my favourite sweet pongal recipe. Rice and dal cooked with the ingredients like edible camphor,elachi, nutmeg and elachi make it smell and taste DIVINELY. This is my mom’s staple recipe. I made this few times now and got appreciation too from everyone when I made it for our home Grahapravesham at Kumbakonam. So from then I wanted to post it here in my blog. I already have a sakkarai pongal recipe in my ulundu vadai post. But its plain and simple without all those special spices.

Monday, October 15, 2012

Rava kichadi is one of my top most favourites. I can live with it. I always love all the recipes with rava/ sooji/ semolina. Upma, dosa, kichadi, pongal…everything . Though Aj and Vj are not big fans, they can eat once in a while. I too make rarely because its greasy and I prefer wheat rava upma for health reasons. I make this along with other tiffin items if friends/ relatives visit. The soft texture and the ghee smell in the kichadi tastes and smells out of this world. Also the yellow colour and vegetables we add makes it colourful.

Wednesday, October 10, 2012

For everybody including me, kolu means the first thing is Sundal that comes to our mind. I have posted this Pasi payaru sweet sundal 2 years back when I made it for my kolu. Last year I din’t post any sundal recipe in my blog. But I did made pasi paruppu sundal, channa dal sundal and verkadalai sundal. Dint concentrated on clicking pictures to post here. Just was excited about my kolu. Yes. I love to keep kolu at my home. This is going to be boring for some of you, so feel free to skip reading this.
I have been brought up seeing my mom keeping kolu. So from my childhood I loved it. My mom every year never misses to keep kolu. We have a ‘mara potti’ full of dolls especially for that. The marapaachi bommai, chettiyar couple are few of my favourites. The festive mood starts few days before by taking out the dolls and sometimes we make cute little dresses for the dolls as well.

Monday, October 8, 2012

I already have a mint chutney recipe in my blog. That recipe is with onion and tomato and little bit of coconut. With the fresh bunch of mint I bought I wanted to make coconut chutney with pudina for idli and dosa. So made last week for morning breakfast. Though I gave Vj with idli, I had with paniyarams made with idli dosa batter :) Even Vj loves this with kichidi, upma and adai too.

Wednesday, October 3, 2012

I always wanted to bake this kind of choco chip cookies at home and kept searching for the recipe that is eggless. One more thing that kept me postpone trying these cookies is the fact that Aj is allergic to cocoa and Vj is not big fan of cookies either. So if I bake these, the only person going to eat the whole thing is me. But few weeks back, Vj showed me a cookie making video and I got very much inspired seeing it. But there is no relation between the recipe I watched and this recipe. This recipe is one, I got from Priya’s versatile recipes, the real super blogger, who has almost all possible recipes in her blog! I found this one very easy and interesting. So just halved the recipe and tried it. And when I took a bite form the baked cookies, I was totally spell bound by its taste and texture. It was just as good as the famous amos cookies I have tasted.

Monday, October 1, 2012

I often make kothamalli thuvayal, we both are great fan of that and also easy to make. But I rarely buy pudina as I don’t get ‘that’ fresh leaves. If I am lucky I use it for making biryani and chutneys mostly. But for past two visits to little India, I am buying a big fresh lovely bunch of pudina and making all possible recipes using it. Chutney, thuvayal, rice, biryani… I will soon post the pudina rice recipe. Thuvayal means my mom to me. She makes it very tasty. I can live simply with different thuvayals. Vj too loves thuvayal varieties. I have made it with little of coconut. You can omit that. What I love in thogayals is there is no need to season/ temper! .

Method

Grind this after cooled down along with coconut, jaggery and salt. Add 2-3 tblsp water while grinding.

Notes

The main thing in thogayal recipes is to balance the red chilli, tamarind and salt.

Adding jaggery enhances the taste.

You can microwave tamarind for 20 seconds to make it soft, after dipping it for a second in water. This makes it blend easily.

Store in a airtight container in fridge and you can use this for 1 week and best for your lunch box when mixed with steamed rice. Use generous sesame oil when you mix with rice. Simple vadams goes well with this.